MOSCOW, Feb 22 (Reuters) - Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Saturday that the peace deal signed in Ukraine had been "sharply degraded by opposition forces' inability or lack of desire" to respect it, the ministry said.

"Illegal extremist groups are refusing to disarm and in fact are taking Kiev under their control with the connivance of opposition leaders," Lavrov told Kerry by telephone, according to a Russian Foreign Ministry statement.

Lavrov "reminded" Kerry that President Vladimir Putin had urged U.S. President Barack Obama during an earlier call to "use every opportunity to stop the illegal actions of radicals and return the situation to constitutional channels", it said. (Writing by Steve Gutterman; editing by Andrew Roche)